**3.2.5 Tanzania**

Tanzania has a population of 42.5 million people of which 75% live in the rural area (United Nations, 2007). This is one of the countries that has progressed well in terms of biogas development and has several case studies. The first one is in the region of Tanga, which is known for sisal production as a cash crop. The sisal is sold to a number of sisal processing companies to produce fibre. Using the available production methods, only 4 % of the sisal biomass is recovered as fibre and the rest is waste, which is either burnt, producing carbon dioxide or left to decompose, producing Methane (The Bioenergy Site, 2009). Utilising sisal waste for bioenergy can thus be environmentally beneficial since 80% of the plant mass is suitable for biogas production, and can also increase profit to the sisal growing farmers (The Bioenergy Site, 2009). With this opportunity in place, UNIDO, through its initiative on "Rural Energy for productive use" established a biogas pilot demonstration project, with the support from Common Fund for Commodities (CFC)7. The plant situated at the Katani Sisal estate in Hale, and utilises the sisal waste generated from the sisal processing plant. The biogas power plant has installed capacity of 300 kW, and was inaugurated by the Tanzanian President in 2008 (UNIDO, 2008). The electricity generated from this plant is used for lighting and running small-scale industries. The company, Katani Limited, also provides energy services to local schools and hospitals in the area (PISCES and FAO, 2009). The company currently plans to expand the capacity to 7000 kW that will be connected to the grid (The East African, 2011).

A Tanzanian Domestic Biogas programme was also initiated in 2007, following a feasibility study by the GTZ. The programme set an ambitious goal of developing 3500 to 4000 units per annum. However, it was estimated that the current construction rate is only 200 to 400 per year (Sika, 2010).

<sup>5</sup> http://www.biogasonline.com/projects.asp

<sup>6</sup> http://www.smart2energy.co.za/index.php/pilot-projects/western-cape

<sup>7</sup> http://www.unido.org/index.php?id=6464

Anaerobic Biogas Generation for Rural Area Energy Provision in Africa 55

costs into the unit they are constructing because they may not get another order for months (Biogas for better life, 2007). Biogas technology in Africa appears to be implemented by technologically driven oligopolies - an economic situation where there are so few suppliers of a particular product that one supplier's action can have a significant impact on price and its competitors (Butare, 2005; Cawood, 2006, Mojaki Biogas Technology, 2008). The price which the typical firm charges depends on the number of firms in the industry. The less the number of suppliers, the less the competition, and hence the higher the charge. This concept is represented in the equation 1. The higher capital cost experienced in African biogas industry is aggravated by the fact that the current market for biogas in Africa is slow. Contractors therefore tend to lump all of their costs into the unit they are constructing

*Q Sn S b P S b P* (1)

because they may not get another order for months (Biogas for better life, 2007).

*Q =* firm sales; *S* = total sales of the industry; *n* = number of firms in the industry; *b* = constant term representing the responsiveness of a firm's sales to its price; *P* = price charged by the firm itself; *P* = average price charged by its competitors.

Substantial cost reduction could be obtained through design optimisations and efficiencies created through economies of scale, as well as smart implementation and planning. In planning, the concept of clustering installations, where a number of orders for digesters within a defined geographic area would accumulate until a threshold is reached could

There is evidence that higher location factors are partly due to the need of importing specialized equipment (World Bank, 2007). In heavily industrialized countries, the equipment is often fabricated in the same area where the plant is constructed; in developing countries, depending on level of technology needed, equipment is generally imported along with specialised personnel to install it, at premium prices leading to increased investment costs. The investment costs are believed to be affected by the geographical location of the country viz: coastal and landlocked locations. However, a recent report by Amigun and von Blottnitz (2010) on the influence of geographical location (coastal and landlocked biogas plants) on biogas economics revealed that the cost of biogas technology is largely independent of geographical location of the plant, which is probably explained by the use of local construction materials in most small-medium scale biogas plants in Africa. The lower the import content of the total plant costs (for example, amount of steel), the less the external diseconomies which may arise in consequence of sliding exchange rates and transportation

Biogas technology represents one of a number of village-scale technologies that offer the technical possibility of more decentralised approaches to development. In addition, this technology offers a very attractive route to utilise certain categories of biomass such as agricultural organic waste or manure in rural areas for partially meeting energy needs (e.g. heating, electricity). This technology can therefore serve as a means to overcome energy

where:

provide substantial reduction of costs.

construction of materials.

**5. Conclusion** 

### **3.2.6 Kenya**

Kenya has population of 40.6 million people, of which 77.8% reside in the rural areas (United Nations, 2007). Kenya similarly has a programme for promoting domestic biogas development, in which the Kenya National Federation of Agricultural Producer is the implementing agency8. The programme targets to install 8000 domestic biogas plants of between 6m3 - 12 m3 capacity by 2013, and prioritizes the high agricultural potential regions. A number of demonstration plants have currently been constructed and launched.

### **3.2.7 Ethiopia**

Ethiopia has a population of 89.6 million people, of which 82.4% live in the rural areas (United Nations, 2007). Through the Ethiopia Rural Energy Development and Promotion Centre (EREDPC) the National Biogas Program (NBP) was also launched. The aim of the programme is to establish 14000 biogas plants between 2008 and 2012, in four regions of Ethiopia (EREDPC, 2008). The NBP utilises cattle manure as the feedstock for biogas production (EREDPC, 2008). In 2009, some households had already started experiencing the benefits of the project such as: use of clean cooking fuel; income savings made in terms of time and money to search for fuel and purchase other traditional fuels (wood, charcoal and kerosene) respectively; and income generation from the sale of biogas to the neighbouring towns (Hivos, 2009b).
